


Post Mordem

by Kinda_Kozy



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst and Humor, Attempt at Humor, Ex-girlfriends are confusing, F/M, Funeral, Hogwarts Sixth Year, Minor Lavender Brown/Ron Weasley, Miscommunication, Post-Break Up, missing moment
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-19
Updated: 2021-01-19
Packaged: 2021-03-18 05:08:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,293
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28861545
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kinda_Kozy/pseuds/Kinda_Kozy
Summary: Ron makes the mistake of seeking Lavender out to try to make sense of their relationship after their break up.
Relationships: Hermione Granger/Ron Weasley, Lavender Brown/Ron Weasley
Comments: 3
Kudos: 5





	Post Mordem

**Author's Note:**

> Originally Written for The Houses Competition - Y6 Week 2. This version has been edited to go beyond the requirements of the competition
> 
> House: Ravenclaw  
> Subject: History of Magic  
> Category: Standard  
> Prompt/s: Four Leaf Clover
> 
> Originally Titled The 'Sham'rock....because no one can stop me when there is a pun

Dumbledore’s funeral had shaken Ron thoroughly.

Now, Harry wanted to leave Hogwarts? 

Sure, it all made sense. Harry was the focal point of this war. Still, there was gravity in the realization that Harry Potter planned to leave Hogwarts. Harry loved the school; if it wasn’t safe for him anymore, was anywhere safe...for anyone?

Ron pushed the shuddering thought aside as he instantly agreed to the conditions of their friendship. He promised to follow Harry, trusting he knew the path ahead. It also helped that Hermione readily rose to the challenge. Ron never had the most confidence in his own decision-making skills, but Hermione had more than enough sense for the three of them to bolster his faith. Their solidarity was a small solace in a world falling into chaos.

They were about to retreat into the castle when Ron spied a figure over Hermione’s shoulder, on the grassy knoll leading to the lake. He took a guilty gulp as he recognized the golden waves of hair and the curvy frame sitting in the patch of daisies.

“I’ll be there in a minute,” Ron mumbled an apology between his friends, regretfully having to release Hermione’s hand.

He blushed as he felt them watch Ron march down the path. 

He announced himself by clearing his throat.

“Hello, Ron,” she said, with her back still turned to him. She, blessedly, did not use the pet-name she had assigned him. 

“Er---h--hi, Lavender,” Ron mumbled, his Gryffindor courage wilting already.

“If you wandered over here to get back together, your timing is just cruel,” She sniffed, diligently focused on constructing a small wreath from the rogue patches of flowers and trefoil undertow. “A wizard is dead. It would be rather depraved of you to try and convince me there’s no time like the present and whisk me off for a go behind our favorite tapestry.”

“I…” Ron floundered at this terribly vivid and oddly specific suggestion. “I’m not here for that.” 

“...Oh,” Lavender snipped, the disappointment in her voice befuddled Ron further. He had hoped whatever happened between them was in the past, but apparently she still sort of liked him for reasons that were well beyond Ron’s reckoning. He thought he’d be relieved after he let her dump him, but he just felt guilty that he had led her on to date him, in the first place. He had been a really shite boyfriend to her looking back on their time together. He hadn’t ever taken her on a proper date, and for all the time they had spent snogging he didn’t really know Lavender. Despite all of it, she seemed to have really liked him, bugger if he knew why. 

And he could probably manage that if the matter was just between the two of them. But there was someone that he did know and did want to be with, just a few steps up the walk. Clearing the air with Lavender just felt like the right thing to do. 

“That’s erm...That’s a nice wreath.” Ron quoted his new favorite book in his head as he stepped around her patch of weeds to kneel in front of her. Apparently, young witches appreciated compliments...Ron might’ve appreciated compliments, too, if he didn’t get so damned uncomfortable when someone paid him one.

“It's a crown,” she pouted. Ron winced at this setback, but too late to go back now. He tried to remember the page from his book entitled Closure…

_Make peace with your past, otherwise it might come back to haunt your new relationships...Especially, if your significant others become ghosts._

“So...erm.” He scratched his neck. He was having trouble applying what he had read to the situation. Head bowed, he searched the grass for the right thing to say. 

There, on the lawn, barely sticking up from the greenery, a small four-leaf clover. He bent down to pluck it up for inspection and—following the advice of the chapter about Gifts—Ron nudged it towards her as a peace offering. 

“What’s that for?” She wrinkled her nose at the skinny little clover.

“Your wreath...crown...thing.”

“It’s too scrawny, besides I’ve got enough.” She threaded a dandelion into her project.

“But it’s got four leaves,” Ron protested thickly, shaking the clover at her.

“Won-won,” she patronized with a giggle. “They’ve all got four leaves, I transfigured them all.” Lavender gestured around to the patch of green she sat in. 

Ron glanced around, counting the leaves of all the counterfeit lucky charms. True to her word, she was sitting in a patch of four-leaf clovers. 

“Huh...fancy that,” Ron grunted, rolling the stem of the one clover he had managed to see between thumb and forefinger.

“Seamus taught me; he says something about ‘making your own luck’,” she explained coyly, fitting the wreath on her head. She smiled up at him, posed as if he were Colin Creevey with his camera ready. 

“So...” Ron perked up, realizing an opportunity. “You’re seeing Seamus?...A-Are we...good?”

“What are you talking about?” She tilted her head, bemused.

“I reckon I should have done this sooner...but y’know, term’s ending early now… I figured I won’t be seeing you for a while--”

“You do wanna get back together!” She bit back a smile. Ron gaped in horror. The suggestion froze the blood in his veins.

“No--,” he started in a strangled yelp, ”--I-” 

“I don’t know, Won-Won.” She contemplated forlornly. ”You put me through an awful lot.” 

“Yeah,” Ron stuttered in agreement. Sod closure. He needed to abort this conversation.

Lavender continued blushing, “And Parvati would just throttle me, if we got back together. I just barely convinced her _not_ to hex you the night we split.” She added fondly.

Ron paled further; Parvati was bloody good shot. “Naahh, you’re right. You shouldn’t take me back.” He winced, watching her make a mental pros and cons list of his nonexistent proposition. He added in desperation, “ _Think of Seamus!_ ”

“But I have missed you, honestly,” She confided, taking his pleas for freedom as balking insecurity. Her glossy lips spread into a playful smile as she formed an idea.

“Tell you what,” she teased. “I think we need some space. Let’s spend the summer apart. No floo calls, and _no_ love letters,” she said with a zealous wink that suggested she meant otherwise. “And at the beginning of Seventh Year, we can meet right here and I’ll let you know my decision.” She narrated her storybook ending with starry eyes gazing somewhere vaguely over Ron’s head. 

Perhaps, Ron thought, he shouldn’t hold himself so accountable for his dishonesty to Lavender. She didn’t really want him, but she did seem deeply invested in the idea of a Ron-shaped blur playing a part in her imagined life. 

Ron grimaced down at the clover that was still pinched in his fingertips. Counterfeit or not, it seemed to have _some_ sway over his luck.

“...Sure.” He sighed, with a glum shrug, knowing he wouldn’t even _be_ here for Seventh Year. He’d rather not risk explaining that, before he accidentally proposed marriage, or something equally dreadful. He flicked the clover aside like a boogey.

“Good.” She beamed as she stood up. “Best start on getting that space now,” she said with giddy diplomacy. While Ron was still retracing the conversation to see where he went wrong, Lavender leaned towards him and glued a kiss to his cheek. His ears burned, hoping Hermione had not seen that.

“G’bye, Ron.” She held his gaze with a private and earnest smile, before flitting away. Ron blinked, completely bewildered by this stranger he had dated. 

His dry throat cracking, he murmured, “Goodbye, Lavender.”

Maybe _real_ closure is overrated. Some ghosts you have to live with.

**Author's Note:**

> So this started as a lot of things....The competition this was made for wasn't keen on Romione stories, so rather than focus on how much he liked Hermione I wanted to explore the dysfunction of Ron's other relationship. I started it with Sitcom vibes, drawing inspiration from Chandler and Janice from 'Friends'. The Google Doc this is in is still titled 'Yemen' lol. And then it took a darker tone...
> 
> I genuinely can't get Lavender out of my head. She and her relationship with Ron were so under-developed, and I guess you can blame that on Harry's observation skills that rival a cement wall when it comes to ANYTHING that didn't have to do with Draco Malfoy in sixth year, but still it irks me.
> 
> I never really liked her when I was younger. She didn't really come across as a sympathetic person; shallow, superficial etc etc. Also I had been a first class passenger on the Ron and Hermione Express so the fact that she "got in the way" was really all the strikes I needed...and I un-apologetically wrote her as vapid and needy as I wished. Then I grew up, and started to realize Hermione wasn't my ideal avatar of girlhood, and start to give Lavender a second chance.
> 
> ...and then I found out "Canonically" she dies... And I realized how profoundly sad that is. The only things we learn about her in the final book is that she was at Hogwarts for her final year, and she fought and died fighting (or "from her wounds"). I believe she called out to Ron when the trio summoned the DA to the Room of Req but maybe that was a fic I read...either way I thought it was a real shame she didn't get a chance to shine. Literally her most memorable scene is when she becomes the victim of violence Hermione was threatened with earlier in the book at Malfoy Manner. 
> 
> And then, I just felt rather slimy. and guilty. For disliking a fictional person for reasons as shallow as she supposedly was to me on my first reads. So this fic is me processing that guilt through Ron. So, I'm sorry, Lavender, you deserved better.


End file.
